Immersion

After seeing The Wall performed live last week I have had a rejuvenated interest in Pink Floyd’s music. Ever since that first listening of Dark Side of the Moon they have been my favorite musical group. I had a Scout leader recommend them and I went to West Town Mall to buy one of their albums (wow, have things changed). I scanned the tape section of Pink Floyd and by luck I picked Dark Side. My mom was shopping, so I went outside and listened to the entire album without interruption, twice. It was the most impactful piece of music I had ever heard. It was unlike anything I had ever heard and even to this day I can sit down and listen to the entire album start to finish and never get board. There was just something different about their sound.

At the time I didn’t know about the messy break up of the band in the mid eighties. I had this glorified view of the band and it seemed like magic. Over time I read more and started to understand that even though the album covers says Pink Floyd sometimes it wasn’t. For instance The Final Cut is pretty much viewed as a de facto Roger Waters solo album. Momentary Lapse of Reason is pretty much a David Gilmour solo album. So I struggle with remaining a purest or accepting individual work under the umbrella of Pink Floyd. No matter which albums you view as Pink Floyd or a charade, there is no denying the real Pink Floyd sound. Its clear when all 4 contributed. The magic wasn’t Water’s lyrics or Gimour’s guitar or Mason’s tom toms or Wright’s piano, it was all of it.

I’m sad there is no more prospect of a Pink Floyd future, as Gilmour and Waters have a strained relationship to say the least, Wright has passed away and Mason has moved on. In recent years Gilmour and Wright worked together on several projects ( On an Island) and toured under Gilmour’s solo name Live in Gdansk). While I can hear bits of Pink Floyd in there its just not the same. Water’s Amused to Death read’s like Pink Floyd lyrics and while its a good album, without the music its just not the real deal. Furthermore Gilmour contributed to a The Orb album Metallic_Spheres. His contribution is clear and gives it a very Pink Floyd sound, but again its not Pink Floyd without the rest.

Maybe the magic was the perfect storm of 5 albums starting with Meddle and ending with The Wall. It was to perfect to last forever or be repeated.